EXPOSED: How To Do Keyword Research Properly To Cash in on SEO

Today I want to cover how I perform my keyword research when going after organic traffic.

Before I actually get into it I’m going to quickly cover What in the world is a Keyword and the two types of keywords you can target for best results.

I’m also going to show you a real life case study on how I do the keyword research and evaluate a few keywords for you.

Keyword Research Tips: What is it?

Before I get into proper keyword research I want to get into what a keyword is. I want to make this article both newbie and advanced friendly. So if you are advanced then most people skip on to the research section below.

A keyword in it’s simplest form is the words you type into the search form before you hit “submit” in Google. So let’s say you go to Google.com and type in “Best Golf Destinations” <–that is called a keyword.

If your blog is about the ‘best golf destinations’ then your goal would be to get your article on page one for that specific search term. (assuming people are actually searching for information on that)

Now let’s get into the two types of Keywords:

1. Short Tail Keyword (Regular Keyword): A regular keyword is basically terms that are from 1-2 terms in length like “Golf” “Play Golf” “Golf Destinations” etc. These type of short keywords are typically very competitive and harder to rank for.

2. Long Tail Keywords: A long tail keywords are typically terms that contain more then 3 words like “the best golf destinations in florida” or “how to improve your golf swing quickly” etc. These type of terms usually contain a little less of a search volume but are way less competitive and easier to rank for.

If you are just starting out in SEO I would highly recommend targeting some long tail keywords and get your confidence up. You can rank for a low competition long tail keyword in as little as 2 weeks to a month depending on the competition and the age and authority of your website.

Now that we got that out of the way let’s get into how to actually find some keywords we can rank for that will bring in great quality traffic to your site.

Keyword Research Tips: Finding the Golden Words

Let’s have a look at finding some great keywords.

I personally like targeting ‘buyer keywords’ . An example of this is:

Anything with the word Review or Reviews at the end i.e “plasma tv reviews”

Specific Brand/model number Keywords like ‘nikon D2100’

‘How To’ keywords ‘how to play golf’ ‘how to cure a cold’ etc. If you can provide a solution this can be golden.

These are the types of keywords I like to target because the conversion rates for these keywords are WAY higher.

Now that you know the keywords I like to target the next step is to find keywords that actually have search volume. To do this we have to open up Google’s Keyword Tool and type in a potential keyword I want to target.

Now there is one thing you have to keep in mind, to the left hand side you will see 3 boxes:

One Says Broad (checked by default)

One says Exact

and the last one says Phrase.

You want to make sure you untick ‘broad’ and make sure you tick on ‘exact’. The reason for this is ‘exact’ will give you the real number of the amount of people who are searching for the EXACT keyword you are evaluating.

DO NOT fall for those gurus who say I am ranking number 1 for a keyword that gets 30,000 searches per month with the ‘broad’ match ticked on.

So from now on be sure you are always using “EXACT”

Now we have to find Keywords that have search volume.

If I were to write all of this into an article it will end up being over 3,000 words and I don’t expect you to be here reading such a long article so for times sake I decided to put together a quick video to show you exactly how I find keywords and show you the exact steps I take.

Hey Brother!
Heard about you through my girl Kim Roach…excellent vid for making Market Samurai finally make sense. I think because the software is jam packed with SEO features, it becomes very confusing at first when you start using it. I love your simplified method. Keep It Simple.

Do some more tuts on your entire process of setting up a site after your keyword research; I think folks will love that, too.

Thanks for stopping by 🙂 I’m glad you enjoyed the tutorial. I use market samurai on a daily basis. I actually learned how to use it from the tutorials they provide when you buy the training. Those videos alone were worth the investment because they share a ton of great SEO info.

I actually set up a complete training program on my SEO approach and launched it earlier this month 🙂 I guess I can take some of the info and share it here on my blog. Thanks for the idea